Week 4: Rep Central
Another week has flown by! This week there were a lot of reps that filtered through. The different reps were from Contract Surfaces, InterSpec, 3-form, Spacia, StonePeak, and HermanMiller. It is interesting listening to all the reps present their product because you can really tell who believes in their product and others who could careless. Why would anyone want to specify a product a rep doesn’t even believe in? I think there were so many reps in this week because they were trying to make their last visits before they head to NeoCon. Every rep also brought some kind of food so, my will power needs to kick in soon or I will be gaining a few more pounds this summer. Tuesday I got my first package! This week I spent most of my time in the materials library working on various things like selecting vinyl and making boards. I didn’t quite memorize all the vinyl patterns, but give me a few weeks and I am sure I will! Along with pulling materials I made contractor boards (see photo below). I made two boards for each project so the contractor can have one board on site and one can be kept at the studio as a reference. While doing the contractor boards I also learned how to properly print labels on the sticky back! Does anyone else remember the tragedies we used to have printing on sticky back freshman year? I had another great week! My goal for this week is to accomplish more than I did this past week. There is already a stack of things for me to tackle Monday when I get back to work. I can’t wait! I hope everyone else is staying busy and has a great week.;)
My Package!
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Contractor Board
Marketing
Until a few years ago Rebecca didn’t have to do much marketing. But she recently brought in the Bradford Group to help Inner Design Studio market to their target market. The Bradford Group helps Inner Design Studio get published in magazines, interviews in the paper, and also just helps Inner Design Studio keep their name out there.
Hopefully you all know from my previous blogs by now that Inner Design Studio’s target market is healthcare.
http://www.innerdesignstudio.com/
When it comes to the strategic planning Rebecca looks at each quarter and evaluates it to make sure there have been enough billings to bring in enough revenue to properly run the company. Rebecca also constantly has to make sure there are projects a few months out that will be bringing in revenue. She can’t wait. She has to be proactive and get future business.
Anni handles all the accounting in-house. During each project there are always reimbursements like travel and presentation boards that are entered to be billed against a project (meaning all these expenses are added to a clients monthly invoice).
The designers log a weekly timesheet against billable time for projects. That way at the end of the month they can evaluate the amount of time they spent on each project. Then monthly the designers sit down with Anni to review their projects and percentage of project scope they will bill. (I think that means what portion of their work they will bill the client). Next Anni writes up the invoices. Then the invoices are submitted to clients based on percentage of project scope on monthly bases.
Below are two HermanMiller reps that gave a healthcare focused presentation at the office Friday afternoon.
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From left to right Lorraine, me, Jodi, and Donna
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Follow-up to the HermanMiller reps Jodi and Donna. Jodi frequently collaborates with the people at HermanMiller who research healthcare. She was at Inner Design Studio trying to share her combined knowledge of healthcare and furniture. Donna did not do much talking, but she is the local rep, so she helped Jodi get an appointment. At Inner Design Studio they use very little HermanMiller systems in their projects, so Jodi and Donna were there trying to sell their products.
I also learned a few things about the women in my short visit with them. Jodi is from Florida and has a beach house for rent if anyone is intrested? And Donna, the sales rep, is not allowed in her kitchen at home. Her husband does all the cooking.
Reader Comments (1)
The reality of keeping a service-related business running smoothly certainly comes through your post. Balancing all the activities to keep a business healthy is quite challenging, as I read in your explanation of calculating monthly revenues and bringing in potential work. Glad you see first hand what it takes to keep a successful business going, which includes hiring, training and retaining excellent employees. In your next post, give us more details of the Herman Miller reps you picture -- this was the new person intro? What are their backgrounds and what lead them to working with Herman Miller? What are the pros and cons of the type of work they do? I agree, the weeks are really flying by!